Inspired by Super Bowl Sub Game from Teaching Math to People with Down Syndrome and Other Hands On Learners

Score Well in MathNow that pre-season football has begun and families have started to think about afterschool sports, here’s a fun way to remember the rules of the sport and practice math skills at the same time.

PREPARATION

  1. Have your child pick a sport
  2. Print out the game board (AKA field) from a bevy of choices on SportsDiagrams.com
  3. Look up the official rules of the game and write them on index cards.
  4. Separate the good ones and bad ones into two different piles – e.g. “Kicked field goal! Score 3 points” in the “good” pile and “Offsides – go back 10 yards” in the bad pile. (Extra Credit : print a copy of the referee signs for an extra challenge and paste it on the back of the index card. You can find some great ones on Google images here.)
  5. Put the math skill you are practicing on a set of index cards. (E.g. times tables, division, addition, subtraction)

PLAY

  1. Set a time limit for the game.
  2. Do a coin toss to see who goes first.
  3. Pick a card from the math skill pile.
  4. Once the player has the answer, the player must announce the result and the other player must check his/her work against a calculator.
  5. If correct, the player takes an instruction card from the GOOD pile and does as instructed.
  6. If incorrect, the player takes an instruction card from the BAD pile and does as instructed.
  7. Play continues until time runs out & the player with the highest score wins.
Score Well in Math